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Coalfield Residents Meet with CEO of Alpha Natural Resources

Abingdon,
Virginia – Eight residents from coal mining areas of southern West Virginia and
southwestern Virginia met this afternoon with Alpha
Natural Resources CEO Kevin Crutchfield. These citizens had requested the
meeting with Alpha because of Alpha's pending takeover of Massey Energy, the
leading producer of coal from mountaintop removal mining. Residents discussed
the devastating impact of mountaintop removal mining and requested that Alpha
make some changes to reduce the impacts of the Massey operations that it is
inheriting. Massey Energy has one of the worst environmental and safety records
of any major coal company.

Community
members attending the meeting were favorably impressed by Alpha's willingness
to listen to their concerns. “I knew that they weren't going to agree to stop
strip mining, but I wanted to tell them about the health issues in our communities,”
said Michael Clark, a board member of Southern Appalachian Mountain Stewards.
“I was impressed that the CEO was there. They didn't do a lot of talking and
seemed very interested in hearing what we had to say.”

The
residents presented a range of concerns to Alpha. Alpha was asked to halt
blasting near the Brushy Fork coal slurry impoundment in the Coal River Valley
of southern West Virginia, which residents fear is weakening the structural
integrity of the impoundment; failure of the impoundment could kill a thousand
people living downstream. Residents also expressed their anger over the poor
reclamation practices on Massey's mountaintop removal operations.

The
residents called on Alpha to switch its coal processing plants to a dry
processing process that would eliminate the production of coal slurry.
Residents discussed how coal slurry impoundments pose a serious threat to
public safety, and how underground injection of coal slurry has led to serious
groundwater contamination in some communities. Dry processing would eliminate
the need for new impoundments or injection sites.

Alpha
promised to look into some of the specific issues raised at the meeting,
regarding the stability of the Brush Fork impoundment, the reclamation
practices on sites like Twilight and Kayford in southern West Virginia, and the
possibility of switching to dry processing for slurry. Meeting attendees were
cautiously optimistic that Alpha will prove to be a better neighbor than
Massey, while also recognizing that surface mining is still an inherently
destructive process: “I think they know that there are productive steps they
can take to reduce the impacts from surface mining and also from coal slurry …
But, with regard to mountaintop removal, destruction is still destruction any
way they do it,” said Debbie Jarrell of Rock Creek, WV and co-director of Coal
River Mountain Watch.

The
meeting attendees are hopeful that this meeting marks the beginning of a
productive dialogue between Alpha and the communities impacted by its mining
operations. Alpha requested a follow-up meeting in July, once the company has
acquired Massey and has had time to investigate some of the concerns presented
at today's meeting. According to Paul Corbit-Brown of Pax, WV, “They haven't
made any promises, but they want to continue the dialogue and they are
interested in our specific suggestions. This is the most hope I've had for
there to be a very meaningful dialogue.”